When asked what engineers and architects usually do, most people typically say “they prepare drawings and specifications on their computer or a drafting table”.  While that response may be partially correct to describe a specific task, the single most important “thing” we do is solve our clients’ problems.

A recent project assignment required us to provide condition assessments, surveying, environmental assessments, and aviation design for a client’s facilities at a number of remote wilderness locations throughout the northeastern United States.  To perform this work, the NKB team utilized helicopters, UAVs, all-terrain vehicles, extra heavy-duty four wheel drive vehicles, chain saws, GPS tracking, satellite phones, wilderness camping, and emergency response preparedness for all team members; all with making provisions for contingencies and backup plans for any unforeseen conditions.  The field work for this unusual project scope was completed without incident and on schedule.  All of those years in Boys Scouts really did pay off in terms of being prepared.

Doing what we are being asked to do is what we do as engineers and architects.  It is in doing each assignment seamlessly, that our clients can be assured that we have their back; making their life easier.  If providing the services of a wilderness outfitter solves our clients’ problems, that’s what engineers and architects do.

Be Prepared.

Going Out of My Comfort Zone | by Laura-Renee Macri

Hi! My name is Laura-Renee Macri and I am a senior studying Environmental and Interior Design at Syracuse University. For as long as I could remember, I’ve been so sure I only wanted to do residential design or just simply decorate homes as a career. My past working experiences consisted of managing an ice-cream store, staging homes, and designing high-end events. Before I started applying for jobs, I wanted the chance to experience what it would be like to work at an architecture firm that specializes in commercial design before I settled on what I always thought I wanted to do. When my former professor and current Interior Designer at NKB, Lauren Zacher, reached out asking if I was interested in applying to be an intern, I knew it would be an amazing opportunity to see if I could succeed in this kind of atmosphere.

At NKB, I was fortunate enough to work on various phases of design, enhance my skills in Revit, pick out materials for GSA projects, and collaborate with Lauren on marketing materials. After working at NKB, I have learned that I love the small firm, team-oriented environment where the architects, engineers, and designers can all work together on the same project. Everyone at NKB was very welcoming and I am sad that my last day for my student internship is approaching.

Post-graduation, I have accepted a job offer as a Junior Designer with LB Architects in New York City. I am very excited to go out of my comfort zone and see what I am capable of doing at an architecture firm.  Without having this experience at NKB, I would not have had the confidence to apply to an architecture firm right out of college and for that I will forever be grateful for the opportunity I had here.

2018 Intern Interior Designers: Allie Eigo (left) and Laura-Renee Macri (right)

An Amazing Opportunity| by Alexandria (Allie) Eigo

Hi I am Allie; I am a senior at Syracuse University studying Environmental and Interior Design. I am from upstate New York and live on Lake George. As a little girl I have always had a passion for interiors, from moving around furniture and making houses on Sims, I knew that this was something I wanted to do in my future. When I was abroad in London last spring I discovered a new passion and appreciation for architectural photography; my love for photography and interiors combined.  I got this amazing opportunity to intern at NKB under Lauren Zacher. Lauren was my teacher my freshman year in college so I was looking forward with working and learning with her again.

At NKB I furthered my knowledge in Revit, learned about the GSA requirements, picked out materials, created a material board, worked on FF&E packages, and fixed redlines on construction documents.  It was a great opportunity seeing how a design firm works on projects in real life compared to school projects. At NKB everyone was so welcoming and helpful during my time there. After interning at NKB, I realized I have an interest in a small firm atmosphere that specializes in commercial design.  After graduation I am planning on applying for jobs in Boston or Charleston to firms that focus on commercial design, lighting design and architectural photography.

Have you ever tightened a bolt?  How tight is tight enough?  Is it possible to tighten it too much?  Whereas these questions might not matter as much when you assemble an IKEA side table for your living room, they sure do matter when you are tightening bolts in a member connection for a steel building. One convention is to follow the “snug-tight” method where bolts are tightened until first sign of resistance and then given another quarter turn.

Another convention is to use direct tension indicators.  Direct tension indicators are washers that have small protrusions on them.  When the bolt is tightened, the gap between the unturned element and the washer decreases.  The size of the gap is then measured and when it reaches the desired size, the bolt is pronounced tightened.  It is often required to have all the connections in a building inspected to ensure tightened adequacy.  But to go and climb up to every connection and hand check each bolt is both extremely time consuming and still subject to human error, especially when there are a lot of connections and thus a lot of bolts to inspect.

Then a special machine is used to tighten the nut without turning the bolt.  But here is where the ingenious part of the design comes in.  When it has been tightened to the required torque, the small spline pops off!  So that is when you know that the bolt is tightened just right and, as an added bonus, it makes for a very quick, easy, and thus efficient connection inspection, you just have to look for all the bolts to have their splines popped off.

Snug-tight conditions and direct tension indicators are still widely used today, so tension control bolts are just another option to use in construction, but a pretty innovative option!

So you have something valuable in your building that you want to protect, like children at a daycare or the entrance to a federal building, yet you want to be able to enjoy the beautiful sunshine and views of the outdoors, what do you do? Thankfully, there are decades of research and many manufactures out there that are able to provide you with products that can provide you a security solution for such a case.

Figure 1: 3M put money inside a bus stop partition in Vancouver, Canada to prove their security glass could withstand nearly any attack by an unarmed person. If anyone could break the glass, they got the money. No one broke the glass.

To tackle this problem, the first real question you have to ask is “what am I protecting against?” Are you trying to protect against a guy with a hammer breaking through your window, an active shooter, falling ice. The gamut is nearly limitless but needs to be defined early on in the decisions making process. Until you narrow that down, the options, and cost, are boundless. If you are trying to stop a burglar, that can be accomplished without too much trouble. If you are trying to stop an active shooter, or are looking for “blast protection”, things get complicated quickly.

The chart below lays out the major categories of protected glazing and potential materials that will accomplish that:Now if that table with all of those options looks confusing, it is. The worst part is that depending on manufacturer, one might make a glass-clad polycarbonate that is UL 752 level 3 rated that is ½” thick, where another might make the same apparent product that is ¾” thick. So how do you choose? It all comes down to what you are trying to protect against, and how important the aesthetic is. Even though many products pass the specific UL or ASTM testing requirements, they often vary in thickness, color, and physical make up and thus may not be suitable depending on the application.

Once a decision is made on what level of security you want and what type of material you want, you then have to struggle with how to secure this very expensive, but very dependable piece of glazing into place. Depending on the material and the manufacturer, you can use a captured system like a storefront or curtainwall system, you can use a custom designed steel framing system with glazing channels, or you might even be able to use mechanical fasteners to anchor through the material depending on its composition. The real factor in choosing the right framing system is the frame’s ability to withstand the kinetic energy distributed to it by the burglar / bullet / blast. Selecting the right frame typically requires engineering calculations and/or consulting a specific manufacturer to select a pre-engineered system.

If all of this sounds rather complicated, it’s because it is. NKB has done multiple projects where the design necessitated that some form of transparent security be provided, and each time we go through answering all of these questions in order to choose the right solution. Transparent security is a building component that requires special attention to detail and to ensure the right outcome. Do not just pick a product off the shelf when dealing with such complex problems, consult a design professional; broken glass in this case is a lot more dangerous than just a sharp edge.

We have all experienced it, you look at the place you live and realize it just isn’t working for you anymore. The layout isn’t conducive to the way you process, you don’t have enough room for yourself, this other room you never use has excess space, and really it all just needs a face lift. Well N.K. BHANDARI has been feeling the same way. So after searching and searching and then analyzing different locations we have finally found our new home; but we aren’t going very far. How close may you ask? Well we are currently listening to them renovating our space as I type this. That’s right we are sticking to our roots here at Rockwest Center and moving one floor up.

So now what we get to do for our clients every day is exactly what we get to do for ourselves. Our team has worked for many months to come up with the best solution for ourselves that will help us create in a more effective work environment. We analyzed the way we work, questioned processes, looked at different trends, questioned the “norm” of office design, listened to our employee’s needs and wants, did A LOT of different layouts, selected a layout, changed that layout, and came up with a design to meet our needs! Now I won’t say we revolutionized the way offices are designed but ultimately we came up with what works best for us. It’s what we do every day for our clients too. Finding solutions to meet their needs.

Here are some pictures of our process and even some of our space before, and the current construction. Final pictures will come hopefully in the New Year once we have moved and settled into our new home!

-Lauren Zacher, NCIDQ

N.K. BHANDARI is pleased to announce it has recently received the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Certificate of Waiver or Authorization (COA) and a Section 333 Grant of Exemption allowing the firm complete use of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV’s) for commercial use.  This added capability allows NKB to provide an expanded set of services to our clients while also ensuring greater safety for the public, our clients, and our employees.

Through the use of our UAV technology, we are able to perform visual inspections of various types for structures including building facades, roofs, towers, bridges in both high definition still images, and 4K video in both the visual and infrared spectrums.  Utilizing our DJI Phantom quad-copter UAV and automatic waypoint navigation, we are also able to provide terrain mapping services through photogrammetry.  These technologies provide us with a set of files which can be utilized in our design platform software to create existing condition drawings and to obtain a topographical representation of any property with greater ease than was previously possible.

At N.K. BHANDARI, we embrace the use of technology to deliver a higher level of service as Architects and Engineers.  By welcoming this technology, we are positioning ourselves at the leading edge of the design community.  Through compliance with current FAA regulations relating to the usage of UAV’s we are able to provide a heightened level of peace of mind for our clients.  All of our clients know that NKB not only works within the existing regulatory framework, but we also maintain all required insurances and operator training to ensure the highest level of client, employee, operator, and most importantly, public safety during our UAV operations.

NKB is excited to continue to lead by example by embracing and utilizing leading edge technology such as unmanned aerial vehicles with visual and infrared sensors to deliver unique results through unrivaled service.

Scott Girouard – Spring Intern 2016

The opportunity to work simultaneously alongside architects and engineers was something I knew I wanted as I entered Syracuse University. I enjoyed seeing the two disciplines build off one another in a responsive manner.

For this reason, I chose to major in Civil Engineering and minor in Architecture. This unique, yet practical degree combination further interested me in how closely the two disciplines could function with respect to one another.

An opportunity to work collaboratively or simultaneously with engineers and architects had managed to elude me even as I entered my senior year. Unsuccessful previous attempts included working on a student architectural competition team, a design-build project, and inquiring about research pertaining to engineering and architecture collaboration efforts.

My internship at NKB came as I shifted my focus to design opportunities outside of SU. Upon my first glimpse of the NKB office I knew I was in the right place. The mostly open space allows me to easily ask engineers and architects any questions I may have.

What I did not know going into NKB was the range of exciting building types that I would soon be exposed to. NKB’s varied project types have allowed me to finally put my engineering and architecture education into practice. Whether it be through working on proposals, doing structural analysis, or working on Revit models, I am always learning something new.

Jackson Honis – Spring Intern 2016

The project experience at NKB has already paid off in both my engineering and architecture coursework. My exposure to varied structural systems at NKB has allowed me to understand the reasoning for different building systems. In return this has allowed me to approach my structural steel senior design project with confidence.

The dynamic environment at NKB also means that I can regularly practice and build on my architectural knowledge. The opportunity to work on real projects has provided me with a new means to practice my Revit skills and technical building knowledge.

The idea of gaining professional practice in a supportive and inspiring environment is one that I could not recommend more highly to students like myself. The exposure to real building projects at NKB leaves me excited to learn more about the fields of engineering and architecture.

-Scott Girouard

The word design can be defined in many ways, but I like one of the Merriam-Webster’s definitions best where design is described as “the arrangement of elements or details in a product or
work of art.” So in other words, it is both how the colors in a painting make you feel, but also how the frame around that painting is constructed and holds that piece of art to the wall. But when it relates to architecture and the space around you where you live and work, what does design really mean?

Design in architecture can mean things like “the spatial relations of the void and the solid space,” “a harmonic juxtaposition of materiality,” or it can be as simple as “the bathrooms are centrally located for the convenience of everyone.” Making spaces and places that are
beautiful and artistic are an important part of architectural design, but the seemingly simply details of where the restrooms are located, and how many cabinets you have can sometimes be even more important. When it comes to making sure the space around you helps your life and work function better, having a design team beside you that asks the right questions, and considers the easily overlookable functional tasks is how you create a space that works for you.

That’s right, your space work for you. You did know that the role of the building around you is to make your life better and easier right? That is what design means to me; design is functionality that also happens to be attractive. The process of design is listening to you to find out what it is that you need to be successful, and then transforming that into a physical space that helps you be successful. This can be as simple as making sure your new office furniture is arranged correctly, or it can mean making sure your new building is tall enough to accept that new very expensive piece of equipment you just bought. Either way the design of how it WORKS matters just as much (or more) than how it looks. Don’t you want your space designed to work for you AND look the way you want it to?